Premium Sound

[DiVin3]

Ok so I have the premium sound system in my '87 LTD CV and I tried hooking up an aftermarket head unit to it. I bought a wiring harness. I plugged the wire harness into just the speakers and that wouldn't work. So I plugged it into the wires that seemed to be goin 2 the amp and that also didnt work. Wat do I do.

[gadget73]

Need to run new wires to each speaker. The 87 is a common ground, and basically incompatible with anything used in a modern radio.

[DiVin3]

Need to run new wires to each speaker. The 87 is a common ground, and basically incompatible with anything used in a modern radio.

thx...i been thinking that I would have to do that and dreading it if I did but I gotta have my sound.

[Archangel]

The common-ground cars are weird at first glance, but there is hope for them. If you look at your harness, there is the 8-wire plug coming from it, then into that is plugged in another harness, with a funny yellow connector thing hanging off it. That second harness is the one for the amp and all that shit, it basically takes the signal from the radio, feeds it to the amp, then takes it from there and feeds it back to the speakers. The speakers themselves do have two wires each, so if you unplug the add-on harness from the 8-wire plug and plug your adapter harness directly into that, then your headunit should work fine. Take a look there and you'll see what I'm talking about...

[Archangel]

Then there is this BS harness, that takes the regular 8-wire harness and reduces it to a common-ground setup, hell if I know why cause the radio itself will run the 8-wire plug directly and can operate 4 speakers independently...

[DiVin3]

Ive plugged the harness into the amp and into the speakers themselves and I still get no sound from my speakers.

[DiVin3]

and what about the red wire coming from somewhere and hooking on the back of the stock headunit. What does it do?

[Archangel]

Ive plugged the harness into the amp and into the speakers themselves and I still get no sound from my speakers.
Crap, then you may have to run new wires to the speakers, like Thain suggested.


and what about the red wire coming from somewhere and hooking on the back of the stock headunit. What does it do?
It has a ring terminal, and attaches to the bolt that sticks out of the factory radio, correct? That's your ground, the Crown Vic radio can ground through both its chassis and one of the pins in the harness, I always use both if applicable. If your new headunit has a bolt sticking out of its back, attach the wire to there. In my truck (same setup as your Vic, minus the amp) I first put in a factory Crown Vic radio so I can run 4 speakers, and I had this grounded both through the harness and with the big bolt in the back. Then I installed an aftermarket radio, and did the same thing - actually with the Sony I was able to use both the angle pieces that the factory radio has to bolt on to the dash, and the slider bracket that sits in the back of the radio, so it comes out just like the factory radio would.

[deepsleep]

I also have the Premium sound system and just bought a Kenwood cd receiver and will be installing tomorrow. The guy at the counter said I maybe I might need to change the wiring to install it. I asked about hooking up the stock amp to the head unit and he said it wouldnt sound right or something.

John deere green, does doing what you said mess up the quality or something?

[Archangel]

Deepsleep, the factory amp is there because the radio itself has a fairly low power output - it is therefore designed for that low power output (which for the amp is really an input), so with your Kenwood putting out a stronger signal I'm not sure if you're not going to fry the amp if you feed it the Kenwood signal. To be on the safe side I'd say just bypass the amp, and run the wires from the radio directly to the speakers - you can buy an amp-bypass harness that is a direct plug-in, or you can cut and splice the wires yourself if you so prefer.

And I'm not quite sure what you're referring to when you ask if it messes up the sound quality, but if it's about the way I installed the Sony radio with the factory L-brackets riveted to its craddle - nope, no issues with that whatsoever, really the only way I can see the sound quality being messed up is if the radio don't ground quite right, but I have it grounded through both the factory harness and a dedicated (very big) ground strap, so it's about as perfect as it's gonna get.

[Bob]

I'm going through the same b.s. right now. From what I've gathered you need a Premium Sound Bypass. I just ordered one and it should be in next week. Scosche and MEtra both make them.

[351m]

The plugs are there for both styles of stock sound systems, all you do is unhook the harness coming from the amp back to the front of the car(the output side, not the small round one) and the other harness for the standard sound system plugs right in. Conversion kits should not be needed.

[351m]

Would you guys like pics for future reference? It was exactly the same as doing it on a Fox Mustang or Exploder with premium sound.

[marquisman]

iv done a buddies 88 merc that has the NON black box. i used a stock harness and wallmart harness. i cant remeber what i did bit i took the stock black and grey connecters apart and switched wires around. same with my 88 with the JBL primium sound and got the square connector(black speaker one going to the amp) and switched a ground and power wire in the grey connector and grounded that fat red wire....and i agree, it should not be hard to do an install.

[351m]

There are quite literally 2 harnesses behind the radio. The plugs to bypass the amp are under the glovebox/kickpanel. No repinning or anything. I will get a pic of mine after Physio tomorrow.

[gadget73]

I would like pics of this. If theres some way I could re-use the original factory wiring and get rid of my spaghetti bs in the dash, I'm all for it. I'd love to be able to neaten things up in there. I had the silver football amp, but its long gone. All the wiring is still there but its not hooked to anything.

[marquisman]

you can make the football amp work. the black box amp is the easiest since you can guy the premium sound harness from schotche that plugs into that little square connecter with the thin wires

[gadget73]

The smoke came out of my football amp long ago. Its since been replaced with a 600 watt Kenwood in the trunk. I'm just thinking of ways to use factory wiring to get sound from the trunk to the front.

[351m]

Ok, it won't let me post pics...

[gadget73]

Use the 'go advanced' and then click attachments on the next page. if the pics are too big, you can't post them. I forget the maximums but its listed on the attachment window how big the file and image size can be.

[351m]

Maybe they were too big then

[351m]

The first 2 pics are of the plug going to the amp, the other pic is of the one from the other set of plugs at the deck and the harness from the speakers.

[marquisman]

this is different, care to explain about the whole set up?lol

[351m]

Its hard to explain, mine has the harness for the standars sound(one black and one grey plug) and it has the small one for the amp. Same as i believe most Fox Mustangs have. so behind the right kick panel there will be the harness from the amp comming up under the carpet and plugs into the speaker harness, there will be another one in there with the same wire colors that isn't hooked up, it will disappear up under the dash same as the speaker wires. Its hard to get a good pic in there.

[deepsleep]

Deepsleep, the factory amp is there because the radio itself has a fairly low power output - it is therefore designed for that low power output (which for the amp is really an input), so with your Kenwood putting out a stronger signal I'm not sure if you're not going to fry the amp if you feed it the Kenwood signal. To be on the safe side I'd say just bypass the amp, and run the wires from the radio directly to the speakers - you can buy an amp-bypass harness that is a direct plug-in, or you can cut and splice the wires yourself if you so prefer.

And I'm not quite sure what you're referring to when you ask if it messes up the sound quality, but if it's about the way I installed the Sony radio with the factory L-brackets riveted to its craddle - nope, no issues with that whatsoever, really the only way I can see the sound quality being messed up is if the radio don't ground quite right, but I have it grounded through both the factory harness and a dedicated (very big) ground strap, so it's about as perfect as it's gonna get.

Thanks for clearing it up. I still havent installed the damn thing. I'll do it this week. I think the walmart adapter thing I got has the amp wire, is that whats needed?

[mitymerc]

There are quite literally 2 harnesses behind the radio. The plugs to bypass the amp are under the glovebox/kickpanel. No repinning or anything. I will get a pic of mine after Physio tomorrow.

So is it just a matter of disconnecting one harness & plugging in another @ the kick panel?

And there is another set of black/grey connectors tucked up under the dash somewhere?

Is this valid for an '87